Loves Mom's Technology and The Nursing Story

Right now I am typing this posts on my mom's new iPad! The school got her and the rest of the counselors one to use for testing and other work they have to do. I must say it is the coolest thing ever, especially when you have the wireless keyboard to go along with it. Reid is having fun watching The Office with Grandpa which gives me a needed break to blog.

I think I am done with Christmas shopping now, and almost done with wrapping thanks to my little man who slept for 2 hours (give or take a few minutes and few crying spells) today. Tomorrow we are heading to Dallas to do one family's Christmas get together. This should be fun, but yet another long trip in the car. Luckily those presents are wrapped and bought thanks to today.

Now that you are all caught up with life and the like, I guess I will fill you in on the nursing story. Oh the saga and drama that seemed to in sue with this in my life. You can read more of the background here in this post. Needless to say we thought the decision had been made. However after a couple of weeks on the formula we realized that it may not work. Actually I realized it first. Mark was just ready for it to be over and done with, and I can't blame him, I had been discussing it non stop in the previous weeks. When we switched him we tried to do it slowly and in varying degrees. We started with the ready made formula for a couple of weeks, then went to concentrate, then eventually to powder. The ENTIRE TIME the boy was "constipated". I say that in quotation marks because it wasn't for real medical constipation where his poop is hard, but he just wouldn't go for days and be MIERABLE. This in turn made us MISERABLE as one might imagine. Believe me I tried many remedies, including putting prune juice in each bottle.

Then one day about 2 weeks into the ordeal I wondered if he would still be able to breastfeed, because at least then he was pooping regularly, even if he was gassy. So we tried it out and he still remembered how! Now that is not to say he got much, I was pretty much almost dried up by then, but it was a start. I was still unsure of my decision until I talked to another mom that had asked if I ever thought it could have been my let down or oversupply. I looked up the symptoms and it seemed to be describing what he was going through before we switched. This gave me determination to go back and try to get my supply up. I started taking an herbal supplement called "Fenugreek" which is supposed to increase your milk supply as well as feeding him, then pumping after every feeding, and then offering him a bottle. Because of this feedings took 3 times as long as normal. It was a rough couple of weeks, part of which I came down with a bad sinus infection or a cold, which was not fun, but we made it through.

We are currently, just this week solely back to breastfeeding. I still carry around formula just in case he still appears hungry (we don't want him to starve), but for the most part we are back to one thing without a whole lot of pumping after feedings.